Model Manners
by Mistress Scarlett
Summary: It's Del Ironfoundersdaughter's first day on the Watch. The streets are mean. The crooks are, well, crooked. And Mama isn't here to hold her hand anymore. (Well, actually she is. Just don't tell Sgt. Anthracite.)
1. Default Chapter

Dearest Grand Mother and, Grandfather  
  
I am writing to tell you that as I am at last Six Teene, Mother and Father have, permitted me to join the Watch!!! I have the Rank of, Lance-Constable and my paye is to be six dolars a month! I will be patrolling along Short street tomorrow morning, which is Troll New Yeare and also the Battel of Koom Valley Day. Father says that this is a Very Grate Responsibilitie, as the Patrician relies upon we of the Watch to keep the Pease between, the Various Ethnic Groups of our Faire City. Uncle Nobby says it is a greate responsibilitie too, on account of, we could all get our heads ripped of. Hope that you are welle and, that Aunt Olaf has managed, to get ridde of the Beard-Lice. I muste now clean my Armor for, tomorrow's Parade, so no more at present from  
  
your loveing granddaughter,  
  
Del.  
  
P.S. Thank you for the tinne of axe polishe and the Candied Ratte.  
  
* * *  
  
"Lance-Constable Delphine Sibyl von Überwald Ironfoundersdaughter!"  
  
"Here, Sergeant!"  
  
"Repeat after me! I [recruit's name] do solemnly swear by [recruit's deity of choice] to uphold laws and ordinances of city of Ankh-Morpork, serve public trust and uphold laws of his/her (delete whichever is inapplicable) Majesty (name of reigning monarch) without fear, favour or thought of personal safety. Gods save da King/Queen (delete whichever is inapplicable) ... and I do what I told or else I get my goohulog head kicked in."  
  
"... head kicked in, sir!"  
  
"Right, you 'orrible little woman - er... Captain Carrot...?"  
  
"I told you, Sergeant Anthracite. Del is to be treated exactly the same as any other recruit. Please continue."  
  
"Right. You 'orrible woman. You follow me! Today we patrol mean streets of city of Ankh-Morpork! You don't like it, you tough banana! Mama ain't here to hold your hand no more!"  
  
"Yes she is, she's just in the next room helping Commander Vimes with the daily rep-"  
  
"You shut up! You follow me now before I feed you to Corporal Drull!"  
  
"I mean, granted, she prob'ly wouldn't actually hold my actual hand, she'd probably tell me to shut up and stop being so bloody soppy, but I expect I could get her to pat me on the shoulder a bit, I mean, if I was really upset..." "Hut! Hut! Hut!"  
  
Captain Carrot of the City Watch suppressed a sigh as the two figures marched snappily out of the Watch-House door and off down the corridor.  
  
"Happens to everyone, don't it, sir?" The comfortable bulk of Sergeant. Colon appeared sympathetically in the doorway. "One day they're darling little angels playing with their Victor and Ginger dolls, before you can turn around they're biting your head off one minute and demanding fifty dollars for a dress for their coming-out ball the next..."  
  
Carrot looked momentarily confused. "Coming out of what?"  
  
* * *  
  
This is what Del Ironfoundersdaughter looked like as a young woman: if she'd been befriended and given a dazzling make-over by the most popular girl in school, she might have managed to come out of it looking like an unattractive gawk who'd never get to date the captain of the football team. At the age of thirteen, Del had found a copy of 'Misftrefs Apollonia's Guide To Moddern Ettiquete and Hostessery' lying around in one of her Aunt Sybil's spare bedrooms. She'd spent an instructive afternoon with it, and had eventually arrived at the conclusion that well-brought-up young ladies were generally expected to run to, well, a little more chest, and a quite a lot less shoulder. Moreover, they were supposed to inherit things like lands and jewels and summer-houses in the country from their fathers - a height of six foot one, a square jaw and a punch that could make most trolls seriously think about getting about their lawful business hadn't really been mentioned.  
  
Since that day, Del hadn't bothered much about the whole 'being a young lady' business. She had, however, bothered quite a good deal about learning to run very fast, kick very hard and hit things with a variety of sharp objects in a very unpleasant manner. As a result, it was remarkable how few people in Ankh-Morpork made remarks along the lines of, oh such a nice personality and what a shame she doesn't take after her mother and she's a lovely girl really once you get to know her. Now she strode down Short Street towards the cheering crowd of trolls, dwarfs and humans-who-just- enjoyed-a-good-three-day-weekend, marching proudly behind Sergeant Anthracite and Corporal Dwarrows with her newly-polished breastplate gleaming in the early morning sun.  
  
* * *  
  
"Were they - did they accidentally get caught in something, Sergeant?"  
  
"No, Carrot, it's more like a... girly thing. Where they put on the white dress, and there's a bloody great expensive party and they walk in and get Presented to Society - our Ermentrude had hers the year before you joined the Watch, if I remember."  
  
"So... they come INTO the room..."  
  
"And it's called a coming-out party, yes."  
  
"I see. Thankyou, Sergeant Colon."  
  
* * *  
  
Behind the mirrors, it waited.  
  
* * *  
  
Del's parents had been quite straightforward with her about The Crown Thing. She'd always thought of it as rather like having psoriasis in the family, or an unfortunate nose, or a funny uncle who had to be kept in a quiet house in the country and visited every second Hogswatchnight. "We don't talk about it," Dad had told her on her eighth birthday, the day he'd explained about the birthmark on Del's upper arm.  
  
Her mother had backed him up; one of the few things Del's parents actually agreed on. "The last thing this city needs is a king or a queen getting into the works of things and messing everyone around."  
  
"We're just, sort of, you know, here. If the city ever needs us. When that happens - if it ever happens - you'll know, that's all. You'll know your duty, and you'll know what to do. Until that day comes, well, we just keep our heads down and try to live the best lives we can, you see?".  
  
Del had nodded vaguely and wandered outside to play with her new toy Klatchian Fire-Engine. She hadn't really given the matter much thought since. Anyway, she'd always had the nagging suspicion that lost princesses were supposed to be, well, a lot more princessy. Small and delicate and always wearing floaty dresses and singing sad melancholy songs while sweeping out fireplaces or grotty old stables somewhere with a full backing chorus of sweet little animals and a single pathetic smudge of dirt on their dainty noses. She had a vague suspicion that fitting into glass slippers was probably involved somewhere. Lost princesses, even secret ones, certainly didn't clomp around the city in size 10-and-a-half copper- toed boots and breeches. They probably hadn't spend half their childhoods at Psuedopolis Yard, learning how to cheat at poker off their Uncle Nobby and clandestinely picking up all the words to the Hedgehog Song. They probably didn't beat their Uncle Detritus seven hours running at rock-paper- scissors. They probably -  
  
"Ow! Aaargh! Buggrit - I mean - sorry!"  
  
They probably didn't not-pay-attention and accidentally stub their toes on their commanding officers while on parade, either. Anthracite turned around to glare at Del. She was a medium-sized troll with dark, heavily polished features and deep-set gleaming black eyes, widely reputed to tenderly care for the Watch's new recruits as though they were her own children. Since her own children had run off back to the mountains as soon as they were old enough to move about in daylight and hadn't left forwarding addresses, recruits rarely saw this as a comforting truism.  
  
"Corporal Dwarrows!"  
  
"Yes, Sergeant Anthracite, sir!"  
  
"What I do with clumsy recruit what can't even parade properly on first day?"  
  
"Int'resting question, that, Sergeant. We could send her straight back to the Watch House." Corporal Dwarrows was grinning evilly behind her beard, which had been plaited and tied with strands of gold-coloured ribbon for the gala occasion.  
  
"That true, Corporal. But then we short - er, I mean missing a Watchwoman. New Year-Koom Valley Day, we need one dwarf, one troll an' one human in each squad. Them rules." Anthracite grinned just as broadly as the dwarf, revealing pointy diamond teeth with ruby fillings.  
  
"You know, Sergeant, the rules don't say that the squad of three has to stick together the whole time though. I really do think that perhaps what this young one needs is - "  
  
The two of them held their hands up and chanted in gleeful unison -  
  
"THE TENT!".  
  
* * *  
  
It was in the costumes at the Disk theatre. It was in Mr. Blannick's Ladees and Gentilmenne's Bootery and Leather Outfitters. It was briefly in the Seamstresses' Guild, although not for long because it sped out again with an embarrassed expression on what would have been its face when it realised what all the hem-hem was actually about. It was in the rustle of the silks at Cosmopilite and Niece's dress shop. With an almost imperceptible flare and flicker, it sent sparks jumping from stitch to stitch, from thread to thread. It bounced into the window glass, and from house to house along the streets. It paused and rested in the mirror above the counter in a fashionable bar, then jumped to a customer's glass, to the window and out into the street again. Suddenly, it was alive, and it was everywhere.  
  
* * *  
  
"Good morning, parade-goers! This is Lance-Constable Del Ironfoundersdaughter of the City Watch! Could Mr. or Mistress Hammersmith of Number Twenty-Two the Shades please proceed to the Lost Children's Tent as quickly as possible. Mr. or Mistress Hammersmith. We have a young lost dwarf, aged twenty-one years, name of Jolly, who says that he can't find his mummy or daddy or Mr.Teddy, and that he misses Mr. Teddy very much. Mother or father of Jolly Hammersmith, to the Lost Children's tent. Thankyou."  
  
* * *  
  
Troll New Year and the Battle of Koom Valley Day, which jostle one another for space on the crowded Ankh-Morporkian social calendar, have long been an occasion of proud and colourful multi-ethnic celebration for the trolls and dwarfs of the city. Unfortunately, for many years what it was mostly a celebration OF was, basically, grabbing one's double-headed axe and/or drinking large amounts of ammonium sulphate, and going out to bash several varieties of organic byproduct out of the opposing species. Some years previously, the day had been the catalyst for a spectacular ethnic riot that had resulted in two severely concussed Watchmen and a nasty scolding from Corporal Carrot. During the tumultuous events that followed, which culminated in the shooting of the Patrician by a (probably) unaffiliated lunatic, the dwarf and troll elders of the city had sat down (in some cases, on several boxes) together to try and work out the logistics of the situation.  
  
* * *  
  
"Attention, parade-goers! This is Lance-Constable Ironfoundersdaughter, requesting that Mr. or Mistress Blatch of Holofernes Street report to the Lost Children's Tent, where their daughter Eleanora is awaiting collection. Repeat, Eleanora Blatch is waiting for collection at the Lost Children's Tent.  
  
* * *  
  
Finally, it had been decided that the previously unscheduled and ad-hoc marches staged by both communities would be replaced by a double formal parade up Short Street - trolls going one way, dwarfs going the other - accompanied by fully integrated inter-species patrols of the Watch to keep an eye on any unscheduled name-calling or making of rude gestures. Finally, both parades would meet in the middle of the street to enjoy speeches from community leaders on Working Together in Tolerance and Harmony, followed by a fun-fair, trash-n-more-trash market and games for the kiddies. Submissions from the occupants of Short Street to the effect that they'd really rather prefer the riot, thanks all the same, were almost universally unheeded.  
  
* * *  
  
"Attention, parade-goers! Lance-Constable Ironfoundersdaughter here. We have two young trolls at the Lost Children's Tent, Mica and Zirconia of Copperhead Mountain. They appear to be brother and sis - oh, sorry. They appear to be sisters. One is approximately five feet, seven inches tall, one approximately six feet, two inches. Both are carrying - ow, stop that - clubs. They seem to be quite distressed. Mother or father of Mica and Zirconia, to the Lost Children's Tent, as quickly as possible PLEASE."  
  
* * *  
  
The addition of a bouncy castle (specially reinforced for young trolls), a petting zoo and the ever-popular Dibbler's Catering Service (conveniently located next to the petting zoo) had cemented the popularity of Troll New Year-Koom Valley Day as what the Merchants' Guild tourism brochures called "A Daye of Funne for Moste of The Familye" and "A Parayde you Doe Notte Want to Miss". However, as any person who has ever had anything to do with organising any public event, particularly one involving large quantities of children, will tell you (provided that he or she is allowed to have visitors now and has managed to stop the insistent background whimpering), there is something in this world far more terrible than all-out- interspecies-warfare. More violent than the pitched (and doubly-ambushed) battle that had been fought long ago on that dreadful day at Koom. More fraught with ancient and terrible hatreds than the worst race riot in Ankh- Morpork's long and dark history.  
  
The Lost Children's Tent.  
  
* * *  
  
"RIGHT, ATTENTION EVERYONE. OY! BLOODY WELL PAY ATTENTION! RIGHT. HAS ANYBODY SEEN TWO TROLLINGS, A LITTLE GIRL AND A BABY DWARF WANDERING AWAY FROM THE LOST CHILDREN'S TENT? Look, I've got three sets of parents here, and none of them are very happy - er, if anyone sees Jolly Hammersmith, Eleanora Blatch, or Mica and Zirconia of Copperhead Mountain, could they please bring them without delay to the - hey, give that back -"  
  
"Er, is this thing on? Jolly? This is your MUMMY. Jolly, PLEASE come back to the nice lady at the tent now, Mummy and Daddy are VERY WORRIED..."  
  
"MICA! ZIRC! YOU GET BACK HERE THIS MINUTE YOU BAD 'LINGS! YOU WAIT 'TIL YOUR MOTHER HEAR ABOUT THIS!"  
  
"Look, you'll have to give that speaker back, sir, it's official Watch property-"  
  
"Hang on a minute! It's MY go! I haven't called our Elly yet!"  
  
"Your attention, please. This is Lance-Constable - give the speaker BACK, please, Mistress Blatch - Lance-Constable Ironfoundersdaughter, er, urgently requesting Sergeant Anthracite and Corporal Dwarrows of the City Watch to the Lost Children's tent, please, Sergeant Anthracite - ow - look, just STOP IT - "  
  
* * *  
  
Almost but not quite out of earshot, in the front bar of the Bucket in Gleam Street, Anthra and Dwarrows toasted one another on a successful morning's work. They both had long and bitter experience with the Tent, which tended to be allocated to female officers because old sticklers like Vimes and Colon insisted (or claimed they insisted) that females were better suited to being the caring, sensitive face of the Watch.  
  
They caringly and sensitively calculated at least another fifteen minutes of good solid drinking time before the crowd'd start trying to *seriously* set Del on fire.  
  
... to be continued... 


	2. Chapter Two

Commander Vimes signed deeply, tilted back in his chair and carefully studied the ceiling. In front of him, a slowly melting puddle of shame and embarrassment filled the space formerly occupied by Del Ironfoundersdaughter.  
  
"So tell me again, Lance-Constable. When you finally caught up with the little brats, they'd managed to... "  
  
"Draw a moustache on the giant portrait of Lars Larscousin leading the dwarf troops into Koom Valley, Uncle Samu - I mean, Commander Vimes, sir."  
  
"And?"  
  
"And they'd managed to sort of accidentally knock over the holy ancient jewelled sceptre of Cadmium son of Bauxite. And it sort of smashed to bits on the cobblestones, sir."  
  
"And then what happened?"  
  
"Well, Mr. Stronginthearm sort of shouted, 'It's all a plot, I knew it all along, let's have at those bloody trolls, lads!' and sort of whacked Coalface around the knees with a ceremonial loaf of Überwaldian Fencing Bread, sir. And after that I don't really know what happened, 'cause there was a lot of shouting and things breaking and people running about and also I think Eleanora Blatch might have bitten me. Sir."  
  
"I see. Well, I'm not impressed, Del - er, Lance-Constable Ironfoundersdaughter. You realise I'm probably going to get called to see the Patrician over this?"  
  
"I'm - I'm sorry Uncle S-sir! I didn't mean it to-"  
  
"Yes, I should bloody well hope you didn't mean it! I'd hate to have to tell Vetinari that twenty years of hard work defusing the ancient hatred between trolls and dwarfs have just been smashed to tiny little pieces, as I might add has most of Short Street, old Mr. Garbanzo's inflatable castle and Dibbler's sausage-inna-bun cart, all because one of my Watchmen bloody well MEANT IT!!".  
  
Del also shifted her gaze to the ceiling, her dark blue eyes stinging like they hadn't done since the time she and her best friend had sampled a bottle of Soggy Mountain Dew from Gerhardtina's dad's liquor cabinet. No matter what happened, she refused to cry in front of Uncle Samuel.  
  
"Ah, Del. What are we going to do with you?"  
  
"Don't know, sir."  
  
The worst part, Vimes reflected, was that he couldn't even bring himself to be properly angry. Godsdammit, the girl just stood there, all bony awkward limbs and hang-dog expression, looking so gormless he didn't even have the heart to shout properly.  
  
"Alright then. Three weeks scrubbing the cells, and you're demoted from active duty for the same period. As, I might add" - he raised his voice slightly - "are Sergeant Anthracite and Corporal Dwarrows, for drinking on duty plus the rampant bloody stupidity of leaving a copper on her first day alone in charge of the Tent."  
  
There was a scuffling outside, as of two heads, one large and one small, being removed from a keyhole, and a kind of disgusted muttering duet, growing fainter in the distance, along the theme of:  
  
"Told you it was a bad idea."  
  
"Did not!"  
  
"I bloody well did!"  
  
"You say, 'Leave young one in charge of tent, be a good laugh, let's go get hammered, why not eh, it New Year-Koom Valley Day after all'."  
  
"Well, you KNOW I have bad ideas, that's what you get for listening to me!"  
  
Del sighed, squared her large shoulders, and saluted her way out of Uncle Commander Samuel's presence.  
  
* * *  
  
The spark was bored, and restless. It crackled around the small and fledgling Guild of Iconographers and zapped through the office of the Ankh- Morpork Times. It dropped in to an intimate gathering at Lady Selachii's house, and caused one of the guests to give another a nasty static shock through a misfired air-kiss. It thrummed and hovered through the streets. Looking for somewhere to go.  
  
* * *  
  
And to top everything else off, didn't it just have to be a full moon.  
  
Dinner at the little house in Shuttering Street was drawing to a close. Del had abandoned all pretence at eating her Vegetarian Paella Surprise, while her mother just pushed it aimlessly around her plate. Angua von Überwald - she'd never taken on Carrot's name, which had made things easier when the two of them finally called it quits just before their only daughter's tenth birthday - was a handsome woman, most of the time, in her early forties. She still wore her hair long and ash-blonde, tumbling down her back in a style her daughter had tried, and failed, to emulate. On Del, any kind of long hair just looked like stringy rat-tails hanging off her head (provided, of course, that the rats involved were a violent shade of orange and prone to tangling themselves in epic knots, which may sound improbable but stranger things have happened in the rubbish heaps around Unseen University). As a result, she generally kept her hair short and told everyone that it was for Reasons of Hygiene.  
  
"So, yeah, I'll make sure nobody accidentally latches the shutters tonight, Mum."  
  
"Thankyou, dear. Now, you're quite sure you're not feeling any... different?"  
  
Del blushed. "Mu-um! I told you, I'm not like you! I'm not gonna get... that... thing. Never."  
  
Angua assumed her best irritatingly-wise-maternal expression, and choked down a vague urge to laugh. "It could still happen, you know. I mean, I was fourteen before mine came, *and* my parents were both ... I'm just saying have some patience, that's all. Some girls develop later than others, it's nothing to be embarrassed about."  
  
Del squirmed and looked down at the table. Her mother had brought this subject up on repeated embarrassing occasions, and had even left a pamphlet on Del's pillow entitled 'What Everie Girl Shouldde Knowe'. It had had friendly little case-stories of girls with names like Mary and Betty who were very proud and happy that they were growing up and becoming w - er, well, you get the idea. And it'd had *diagrams*. With cutaway pictures of mysterious blue fluids leaking out of various internal organs. Del hadn't been able to use the pillow for a week afterwards.  
  
* * *  
  
Old Mrs. Cosmopilite furrowed her already-quite-furrowsome brow, making that very special critical "errm" noise that usually means the noise-maker is trying to formulate his or her uncomplimentary opinions into a phrasing that will neither injure the feelings of the criticise-ee, nor earn the criticise-er a swift kick in the kneecaps.  
  
"It's a bit... you know, dear. You wouldn't be able to wear it down the shops."  
  
"Yes, Aunt Marietta."  
  
Emmelina Cosmopilite sighed, and turned back to the sewing machine. She really thought she'd had it, that time. The dress had fluttered through her dreams the night before, and whispered around her head all day as she worked on half a dozen amazingly boring cotton petticoats for Miss Greystread the piano teacher. Of course, now that her great-aunt held the shimmering scraps of fabric up to her more-than ample bosom, Emmelina did see her point. Who, of the rather matronly ladies that patronised Cosmopilite and Niece's dress shop, would be caught dead in a slashed satinette bias-cut evening gown with an asymmetrical neck-line and a strong Klatchian influence around the waist and hem? She took the dress back from her great-aunt, draping it carefully across a workbench in the far corner of the room. Neither of the women noticed the tiny, barely crackling blue sparks that darted from the folds of the fabric.  
  
* * * Angua stalked the night-time streets, occasionally checking her reflection in a shop-window to make sure the polished copper badge was still firmly secured at her throat. She paced by Chalky's all-night pottery, where a couple of shadowy figures were arguing about the cost of repairing an extensively-damaged sausage-inna-bun cart. She picked her way over the loose cobblestones and sad scraps of inflatable rubber that littered the entrance to Short Street, shaking her head. Ah, Del. Angua had tried to hint as tactfully as possible that the Watch was no life for someone so, well, let's face it, clumsy and... and vague, and just not quite tuned to the frequency of reality. But the girl had dreamed about being in the Watch since Angua and Carrot had started bringing her to work with them at the age of four and a half. It was their own faults, really. They'd used to park her for days at a time in a nice safe cell with her wooden toys and highly educational Leonard da Quirm colouring-in book. They'd get Cheri or Colon to look in on her every so often with food, while they raced around the city solving mysteries and heroically saving the day. They'd joked that between them they'd managed to solve the problems of in-house childcare and recruiting both at once. Back in the time when they'd still had love and pride in common, enough to let them imagine it could somehow all work out. Angua sighed, a strange hollow sound echoing through the warm spring air. At least something good had come out of it all. Her daughter had been a sweet child really, all wide eyes and freckles and the kind of dragging- socks-and-scraped-knees tomboyishness that stops at 'cute' before veering left into 'actually-kinda-creepy'. And then quite suddenly, Angua had turned around one day and found this big, hulking, red-haired not-quite stranger, thumping around the house and actually eating the dwarf bread, bringing home a copper badge and breastplate with her face scribbled over with innocent, simple-minded pride.  
  
She expected the girl to start saying "D*mn" any day now.  
  
* * *  
  
Immanuel Blannick was the son of a cobbler. He was the son of a son of a cobbler, who was himself a son of a cobbler, who was a son of an innkeeper, which just goes to show how a family can move sideways in the world*. All his life, he'd toiled in his Dad's little shop in the Street of Cunning Artificers, until one depressing day it had become his own little shop in the Street of Cunning Artificers and then he'd toiled twice as hard and for twice as long because that was what you had to do when you were the one that signed the wage cheques. Over the years, Manny and his loyal team (which mostly consisted of Mistress Coralie Nailsande, old Tommy No-Thumbs and little Bobby Cattermole whose mother wanted him to learn a decent trade) had made more kinds of footwear than they could possibly catalogue, even in the glossy thirty-page Blannick's Annual Home Shoppinge Catelogge. They'd produced stout boots for the men (and women, and dwarfs, and even tiny little ones for the gnomes) of the City Watch. They'd painstakingly stitched delicate high-heeled ladies' slippers for dancing and promenading (and collapsing against a wall screaming "OUCH!" and demanding some sticking-plasters and a carriage home). They'd made shiny squeaky black dress shoes for wearing to one's wedding with the letters "HE" and "LP" amusingly chalked on the soles, and chunky brown sandals for wearing afterwards with grey woollen socks while on one's honeymoon on the beach at Klatch. They'd even made some really *interesting* leather... um... things, on a special order for Mrs. Palm's House of Negotiable Affection. But Manny had never been as proud of any of them as he was of the shoe he held up to the light at this moment. The lines, the symmetry, the insouciant little twist to the stitching on the side buckle that would never be noticed by anyone who hadn't spent twenty-five years learning to appreciate fine footwear... With a dreamy smile, he lifted the little leather brand out of the fire, applying it with pride and pleasure to the shoe's inner lining, letting the world know that this was a "MANNY BLANNICK ORIGINAL".  
  
This was not just any old shoe.  
  
This was a shoe with sole...  
  
* * *  
  
Plink!  
  
Plink!  
  
Plin-  
  
"D*mn!"  
  
"Aargh! Sorry!"  
  
The first two stones bounced cheerfully off the window glass, while the third bounced somewhat less cheerfully off Del's forehead. In the street below, right arm cocked in a suspicious throwing-motion, stood Del's former schoolfriend, a young woman rejoicing in, or at least grit-toothedly- putting-up-with, the name of Gerhardtina Sock. The two had shared a desk at the Ankh-Morpork Mostly Public School until their departure two weeks previously, when Del had left to join the Watch and Gerhardtina to work in her uncle's sausage shop.  
  
Now Gerhardtina looked like a *real* lost princess if Del had ever seen one (and she did, while brushing her teeth every morning). Despite belonging to a family of butchers, generally not a factor conducive to the development of overwhelming physical allure, Del's best friend possessed the kind of figure that, if it didn't stop traffic, at least severely interfered with orderly vehicular progression (particularly if Corporal Nobbs had been put on crossing-guard duty). Although nearly as tall as Del, Gerhardtina was built along the lines of a graceful racehorse or slender whippet rather than a mysterious shaggy creature brought home from the local animal shelter. She had rather a lot of silky black hair and a face like a slightly snooty-looking china doll that Del had owned briefly as a child before using it as a bat in a game of Ankh-Morpork-Rules** with Arthur Throckmorton and Jeremy Naylor down the street. She was also, to Del's current discomfort, both an insomniac and a less-than-crack shot with a window-pebble.  
  
"What's up, then?"  
  
Gerhardtina grinned cheekily, an expression entirely at odds with a high- boned face so obviously built for a simper or a haughty scowl. "Heard your first day at work didn't go so well." "You and the rest of the city."  
  
"So I came to cheer you up."  
  
"Aren't I lucky."  
  
Gerhardtina amiably fired another rock. "So are you gonna be cheered, or not?"  
  
Del smiled weakly. "Sorry. Thanks, really, it's nice of you to come over. I'll just go downstairs and let you in, there's loads of supper left it you're hungr-"  
  
"Nah, mate. You're coming with me! I've got something special to show you."  
  
"What?"  
  
"Oooh, interrogate me, Copper Del!"  
  
Del frowned, and leaned further out of the window into the warm night air. "C'mon, what is it?"  
  
Gerhardtina was all but dancing. "Can't tell you. You've gotta come and see."  
  
Feeling vaguely intrigued, Del nodded, spat on her hands and began to shin down the specially-fitted reinforced drainpipe***, leaving her blister- inducing new boots on the floor beside her bed. She landed squarely on the paving and grinned back at her friend, forgetting all about Sergeant Anthracite, Commander Vimes and Short Street, feeling suddenly barefoot and adventurous in the middle of her own dark city.  
  
"Alright then. Let's go and see".  
  
* Although there is insufficient space here to go into the frequently Byzantine, and occasionally Constantinoplian, workings of the class order in Ankh-Morpork, suffice it to say that although 'upward mobility' is almost unknown (except in the relatively unique case of Sir Samuel Vimes, who is on record as saying he wished he'd never heard of the bloody stupid idea in the first place and pass the godsdammned caviar), the relatively uninterrogated dynamics of 'sideways mobility' remain one of the more fascinating elements of the Ankh-Morporkian social system.  
  
** Ankh-Morpork Rules is a street game generally played eighteen-to-a-side, popular with small children and very, very drunk people. Broadly, it involves hitting as many other players as possible as hard as possible and then running away before someone's mother and/or the Watch catches up with you. Many city-states and nations have developed their own form of sporting code known geographically as "Klatchian Rules", "Sto Helit Rules", etc. As far as can be determined, Ankh-Morpork Rules is the only sporting competition in the multiverse chiefly characterised by the fact that it appears, to the casual observer, to have *no rules whatsoever*. This makes it roughly the dimensional equivalent of what is laughingly called "Australian Rules" in our own universe.  
  
*** Although Del had spent most of her life using a perfectly sensible set of stairs to get from the first floor to the ground, the conveniently- located drainpipe had been a present from her Aunt Cheri, who felt that every girl should have a drainpipe for her young man to climb up in situations of romantic emergency. Del, who hadn't had the heart to suggest otherwise, mostly used it for popping out and scaring the gargoyles on the roof whenever she was bored. 


	3. Chapter Three

*Waves* Hi there, everyone, and thanks to all the people who've left such nice comments! Apologies for taking so long with this chapter, I guess the holidays have gone to my head... Anyway, here's some more adventures, as Carrot and Angua stumble across a mystery, Del scrubs some disgusting cells, Gerhardtina gets new clothes, and the occult force abroad in Ankh- Morpork becomes more, well, occult...  
  
Chapter Three  
  
Corporal Cheri Littlebottom let her shoulders slump, and pulled the sheet back over the dead girl's head. The circle of worried faces bent over the table turned towards her, a study in shades of pity, horror and exhaustion.  
  
"So tell me again how this happened?"  
  
Carrot was the first to speak, looking down at the helmet he'd removed as a sign of respect, and now turned over and over in his hands. "Well, Captain Angua was patrolling in... er, her other form, and she smelled - er - that is to say, something -"  
  
"Someone. Someone dead, Carrot."  
  
"Yes, quite. Someone, er, deceased, near the south end of Street of Cunning Artificers. The girl was in a rented room at Mrs. Rackthorne's, and she was pronounced deceased by Sergeant Detritus and I when we arrived on the scene at about 2100 hours."  
  
"And you can't give me any more information than that?"  
  
Carrot frowned. "Other than that Angua said, and we both agreed, that the girl looked as though she'd been... well, as though someone had been starving her."  
  
Detritus shuffled awkwardly. "I carry her back to Watch House with one hand. Her too light for human that size, don't feel right."  
  
Cheri frowned, and walked over to the specially-built sink to remove her surgical gloves. "Exactly. It's weird. She probably had some kind of a heart attack; severe malnutrition over a long period'll weaken the cardiac muscles. But otherwise, she's physically fine. No sign of being locked up, or even restrained. I don't understand how this could happen."  
  
Angua let out a low growl. "This is crazy! It hasn't been that hard of a winter. The Thieves' Guild haven't even put their prices up, and you know what they're like when it comes to maintaining wage parity, 'an honest day's pay for a dishonest day's work' and all that. There's no reason for anyone to starve to death in Ankh-Morpork. I mean, if it was food poisoning, we'd only have to go and haul in Dibbler. But this..."  
  
"It's just... I mean, you can't exactly call it murder, can you?". The four filed out of the autopsy room. Detritus and Cheri headed down the corridor towards the coffee room, in pursuit of a well-deserved cup of powdered shale and freshly-squeezed rat juice respectively. Carrot and Angua turned back towards the front gate of the Yard, strapping their helmets back in place. Awkwardly, he extended a hand to pat her on the shoulder.  
  
"You're all right, Angua." It was a statement, rather than a question. If the years had taught Carrot nothing else, it was that Angua was always, and ultimately, able to take care of herself.  
  
"It's just... oh, it shakes me up every time. When we bring in one that looks about Del's age. I've said it before and I'll say it again, this is no city to bring a child into." Turning away from his honest, puzzled gaze, Angua pretended to be very busy re-tying one of her boot-laces.  
  
Carrot smiled reassuringly. "But she's fine. Safe and well and downstairs in the cellar as we speak. Probably not all that happy at the moment, but she'll get the hang of being a Watchman sooner or later."  
  
* * *  
  
"YOU HURRY IT UP, YOU HOPELESS RECRUIT!"  
  
"But I'm *going* as fast as I - "  
  
"YOU KEEP GOING AT THIS RATE, YOU NEVER GET THE HANG OF BEING WATCHWOMAN!"  
  
Del sighed, and reapplied her scrubbing brush to the toilet. To say that she hadn't quite imagined life in the Watch like this would be an understatement. For a start, her childhood daydreams hadn't included nearly so much really disgusting biological material, nor being manically berated by a commanding officer who didn't have a heart of gold so much as fists of solid obsidian. Neither had she pictured her career in the Watch involving quite such an unpleasant amount of a liquid labelled Lemmon Scentede Summre Fresh Bleache (Doe Notte Use In Enclowsed Spaces).  
  
Next to Del, Corporal Dwarrows was applying a small, frazzled toothbrush and a jar of Mrs. McGillycuddy's Scoure-Alle to the bars of the cell, levering off small bits of dried crusty unspeakableness left behind by Grabber Hoskins, its previous occupant. On the other side of the bars, Sargeant Anthracite was 'supervising'; a role which mainly seemed to involve shouting very loudly whenever she spotted anyone without bleeding hands or an expression of exhausted revulsion upon their faces.  
  
"She's not so bad, really, once you get to know her" Dwarrows had said that morning, when the two of them had been filling the bleach bucket at the pump in the Yard. "Just a bit old-school, learned all that shouting-and- kicking-rock stuff from old Detritus back in the early days. An' of course, she's not too impressed with us at the moment, me 'cause I got us both in trouble with Old Stoneface, and you 'cause, well, I think she just likes shouting at you, to tell the truth."  
  
Del had nodded weakly. The prospect of being screamed at by Anthracite for the next three weeks solid was still less frightening than the prospect of having Uncle Samuel be Disappointed at her again. Now she winced as the Bleache (Now Witthe New Super-Cleening Hijene Action!) slowly soaked through the top layer of skin on her big square hands and began to gently nibble its way through layers two to six.  
  
In a nearby cell, Jeremy Plowtrucker (formerly of the Thieves' Guild) was having a tremendously entertaining morning. Life had been somewhat dull of late, ever since Sargeant Colon had locked him up for his own protection following his daring heist on the Guild of Musicians the week after his Thieving Licence had expired. Jeremy was quite enjoying his time in the Watch House cells; indeed the novelty of a roof overhead and four walls, let alone walls cleaned by fine strapping young lasses in copper helmets, had yet to pall for him. However, he did miss the danger, excitement and shouting of the life of an unlicenced thief. Nobody had even tried to kill him for two days now! Bored, he cast once more around the cell for something to do, and dug around in his pocket. He pulled out a small harmonica that'd miraculously* survived his ingoing search, and began to play a melancholy prison-row tune.  
  
"PRISONER! YOU SHUT UP THAT NOISE THIS MINUTE, OR WE TURN YOU OVER TO THIEVES' GUILD!"  
  
Jeremy smiled. This was more like it...  
  
* assuming the adoption of a rather, ahem, 'elastic' definition of the word 'miraculous'  
  
* * *  
  
Gerhardtina Sock swirled lightheadedly before the mirror, dark red satin and long black hair floating and billowing around her. The fit was perfect, even to the tumbling tatters of the assymetical hem that just brushed the floorboards. This was lucky; as the dress had been given to her for free by a friend of a friend of her mothers', and alterations would not have been a possibility.  
  
It was the jewels that were the problem, that's what Emmelina, Mrs. Sock's dressmaker's niece, had said. She'd stood outside the screen while Gerhardtina tried the dress on, a small, worried-looking young woman with severely scraped-back colourless hair and a pincushion permanently affixed to the front her dress. The jewels were in the food, Emmelina said, and that was what made you fat. They could even kill you, apparently. Little gems, in all food and drink, so small you couldn't even see them.  
  
"What, like, ground up really fine?"  
  
"Yeah, something like that."  
  
"Sounds strange."  
  
"Well, that's what happens, anyway, take my word for it. And that dress, well, it's special. It deserves to be worn by someone thin and beautiful. Someone like you, that's why I'm letting you have it. Not some rich fat old cow who stuffs herself with pork scracklings and chocolates all day long. Meaning no offence to your lady mother, I'm sure, Mistress Sock."  
  
At that moment, Gerhardtina had stepped out from behind the screen, the dress sweeping behind her. Emmelina had let out a gasp, and looked on the verge of tears. Gerhardtina had studied her with her hands on her hips, a puzzled expression creasing her elegant high-boned face.  
  
"Jewels in food? That make you fat? I've never heard of anything like that before."  
  
Emelina squared her small, round shoulders, looked away from Gerhardtina then looked back with an expression that had its metaphorical mouth full of pins.  
  
"Do you want to wear the dress or not?"  
  
"Killer jewels. Right. Got it."  
  
* * *  
  
At Blannick's Ladees and Gentilmenne's Bootery and Leather Outfitters, Coralie Nailsande was having an extremely busy morning. She'd sold sixteen pairs of Manny's new-design sandals, ten keyrings (which were essentially just the 'Blannick's' crest emblazoned on a small piece of leather), eight pairs of boots, twenty-five pairs of Blannick's Shoe Laces and one of the pokers out of the fireplace. She'd never seen anything like it, as people had begun crowding into the shop, thrusting handfuls of money at her. It was as though they were suddenly, mysteriously, prepared to pay large amounts of money for anything that had the word "Blannick's" stamped across it.  
  
In the back room, Manny, Tommy and Ben were cutting, stitching and occasionally yelling "Aargh! Bugger! Fetch me a sticking plaster!" as quickly as possible.  
  
* * *  
  
At Unseen University, the table was in the final stages of being set for lunch. Mustrum Ridcully, the University's longest-serving Arch-Chancellor, sank into his seat after a hard morning's sock-hunting**. He found himself looking up into two sheets of glossy paper that appeared to have been stitched together to form a kind of booklet. One of them showed a cheap, high-coloured iconograph of a woman wearing expensive clothes and several lines of print that promised, among other things, "BETTER WOSSNAMES NOW" and "LOSE FIFTEEN POUNDS IN TWO WEEKS". The other page was devoted to a large picture of what looked like a very fancy, exquisitely-crafted bottle of cat's urine.  
  
"I say, what've you got there, old fellow?" Ridcully asked, in a tone somewhere between forced joviality and stern interrogation. The sheets of paper moved downwards, to reveal the beaming face of the Dean. "Oh, this is the latest edition of 'Ankh-Morpork Vague', old chap."  
  
"What?"  
  
"'Ankh-Morpork Vague'. It's only the most fashionable fashion magazine in the city. Do try to keep up. I've just confiscated it from one of the maids for trying to read it and serve soup at the same time."  
  
Ridcully held out his hands expectantly, and the Dean passed the magazine over. The uncertainly hopeful expression that clung to his face flickered and died as the Arch-Chancellor flicked through the pages, stopping to sniff the free Fold Out Perfume Sample of L'Eau de Chat.  
  
"Hogwash."  
  
"I beg your pardon, Arch-Chancellor?"  
  
"This is a waste of paper, Dean. Lot o'rubbish about clothes and shoes and silly little bits of jewellery, not a proper magic ring among 'em. And I hope you're not plannin' on trying any of those Sixteen Ways To Wear This Season's Swimsuit, or I shall be very upset. Back to the kitchen it goes."  
  
The Dean scowled at Ridcully's retreating back as the Arch-Chancellor strode off towards the kitchen door, and went back to trying to calculate the number of killer jewels in his soup.  
  
** Having finally given up on the wildlife around Unseen University, Ridcully had instead focussed his urge for bloodsports on the disturbing large number of missing socks that now freely roamed the corridors of the University following an unfortunate experiment with space-time and wormholes by Ponder Stibbons of the Faculty of High Energy Magic.  
  
* * *  
  
"Mmn, that's good rat juice! How's the powdered shale?"  
  
"Good. Hey, Littlebottom?"  
  
"Mmn?"  
  
"This yours?"  
  
Cheri reached out as Detritus handed her the sheaf of paper that someone had left lying on the table in the tearoom.  
  
"Hmmn. 'ANKH-MORPORK VAGUE'. Looks like a magazine of some kind. 'NEW SPRING LOOKS FOR EVERY SPECIES'. 'BUY NEW CLOTHES NOW'. 'LOSE FIFTEEN POUNDS IN TWO WEEKS'. How'm I supposed to do that, take off my chain mail?"  
  
"Don't know. Doesn't sound like much fun to me."  
  
"Mmn.". The glass of rat juice stood, half-empty on the table as Cheri continued to flick through the magazine...  
  
* * *  
  
"ALRIGHT, SQUAD! IT QUITTING TIME! I BETTER SEE YOU BRIGHT AND EARLY TOMORROW MORNING READY TO SCRUB SOME DIRT! NOW BEAT IT!".  
  
Del carted the bucket of bleach to the drain, slumping wearily. She really needed to get an early night tonight; last night had been exhausting and puzzling enough without being followed by this horrible lemon-scented day. A few feet away from the drain she tripped, splashing the revolting fluid all over the Yard and across her boots, where the leather began to gently smoke and curl up at the edges. Eventually the bleach found its way to the tiled hole in the yeard, and Del watched it swirl over the dirty grey stone and away into the blackness of some unknown underground part of the city.  
  
After Gerhardtina had turned up in at her bedroom window the night before, Del had followed her along Shuttering Street and across several alleys' worth of shortcuts until they'd ended up in a road she didn't know at all, hadn't seen before even on all those long walks around the city with Dad. The warm air and the stars had been invigorating, true, but after all that night-time walking, Del had been expecting something good. A surprise party maybe, or a circus just arrived from the Sto Plains, maybe even a dance at the Young Men's Reformed Cultist's Hall. Instead, Gerhardtina had led her by the hand, giggling and skipping with excitement, to something Del never would have expected in a million years...  
  
A shop window, dark and empty save for a single gleaming, highly-polished mirror. 


	4. Chapter Four

Chapter Four  
  
After tipping the last of the bleach down the drain, Del headed for the front hall of the Watch House to sign herself out. At the desk, a small and wizened figure was bent over a large piece of parchment, happily spreading epic blots over the page with a bent and mangled feather quill. Del bent over to write her name on the sign-out parchment, holding her hand out for the quill.  
  
"'Ere, miss. It's knockoff time, so why the long face?"  
  
Del felt the now-unfamiliar stretch and yaw of a smile spreading across her face. She had been 'miss' to Uncle Nobby ever since she was a few hours old. Her mother had explained that it was the only term of address he knew towards females who weren't a) blood relations or b) trying to kill him (the situation, they both reasoned, probably hadn't really come up that often). Although known for adopting a sleazy and faintly predatory attitude to anything in skirts, Nobby Nobbs had always been fanatically protective of his adopted niece, an uncle-ly affection that was probably underlaid by a healthy fear of the consequences of failing to be protective if such failure should ever be discovered by either of Del's parents.  
  
"Old Stoneface still on yer ar- er, tail about Short Street, then?" Nobby clucked sympathetically. "I shouldn't worry about it, miss. Forget about it in a couple of days, he will, as soon as there's another nice bloody murder to take his mind off things."  
  
Del smiled weakly. "Thanks, Uncle Nobby". She replaced the quill in the stand, wiping the inky residue onto her already-grimy breeches. "Now if only I can manage to stop smelling like-"  
  
"Lemmon Scented Summre Freshe Bleache" Nobby grinned. "'Orrible stuff, miss. I've been put on scrubbin' cells enough times meself to know what that smells like. Only one thing'll shift that out, and that's a good two or three hours in the pub. Littlebottom and Dwarrows and Swires and that're all going down the Bucket at end of shift. You come along too and we'll stand you a bit o'dinner, likes."  
  
Del pictured the expression on her parents' faces if they discovered her in a pub. "But, but I'm underage, and -"  
  
"Nonsense, miss. You're old enough to do a copper's work, you're old enough to be in the Bucket with the rest of us. No drinks, mind. I'm sure your Dad'd say the same, if he wasn't-"  
  
Del tipped her head to one side, giving her uncle a cool, appraising stare that Corporal Nobbs found uncomfortably familiar. "If he wasn't what, Uncle Nobby? Where is Dad, anyway?"  
  
"Well, he's working on a special case, that's all. Came in this afternoon, bit of an unusual circumstance sort of thing. Mister Vimes sent him and yer mum off special. Can't say any more than that, miss."  
  
* * *  
  
She couldn't sleep. Couldn't sit still, couldn't stand. Even when she sketched her designs now she could sit still for only a few minutes before she'd leap to her feet again, pacing the room. Blue fire licked at her hands, crackled through her skull, whispering, singing, screaming in her head until the tears ran down her face.  
  
MAKE BEAUTY. *BE* BEAUTY. BRING WHAT IS BEAUTIFUL INTO THE WORLD. BE NO LONGER MEAT, NO LONGER A BODY, BUT BEAUTIFUL BONES OUTLINED IN LIGHT.  
  
The whirring of the sewing machine would shut it out, but not for long.  
  
* * *  
  
From "Misftrefs Apollonia's Guide To Moddern Ettiquete and Hostessery", p.41  
  
"Under no circumstance shoulde a Young Ladie enter a Public-Houwse or other Building of Ill Repute. If by some accident or necessity she should be forced to spend time in such a Playse, she should conducte herself with Utmost Propriety at all times. Under no circumstances should she partake of Foode or Drinke or attempt to Eavesdroppe on Conversations Not Fitte For A Mayden's Eares."  
  
* * *  
  
Del slurped at the pint of straight lemonade Uncle Nobby had insisted she order, and toyed with the little paper umbrella Uncle Detritus had allowed as a concession to frivolity. Far from being a smoky, excitingly-shadowed den of iniquity, the Bucket turned out to be a large, reasonably well- scrubbed room filled with, well, most of Del's extended family. One of the disadvantages of being the daughter of two coppers, as she had discovered when quite a small child, was the relative impossibility of ever getting away with anything; even a broken window or a class bunked off would usually result in word getting back to an angry - or worse, Disappointed - Mum or Dad. Another part of the job description appeared to be being on familial terms with almost every person in this bar. Even as she looked around Del could see Uncle Reg poring over the letters section of 'The Times' in one corner, Uncle Visit earnestly showing pamphlets to Corporal Dwarrows in another, and over at the dartboard Uncle Morraine, who appeared to be attempting to score a bullseye using Uncle Buggy as a dart.  
  
"So... Carrot and Angua didn't say if there were any suspects?" Hearing the anxiety in Aunt Cheri's voice, Del mentally returned her attention to the conversation around her, while physically pretending to be fascinated by the gnome's arcing progress towards the dartboard, toothpick-sized sword in hand. She gently relaxed her features into a useful expression of all- purpose dullness.  
  
"Nope. She just headed straight out the door, and he went in to see Mister Vimes." "Stayed in dere... thirty-two minutes. Den he come out again and head off too. Ain't seen either of dem since".  
  
Nobby lowered his voice to that hissing sibilant tone that people use when they're deluding themselves that a person sitting only a few feet away is unable to hear them. "'N when Carrot signed out, 'e told me to look after little miss there, make sure she gets fed an' goes home safe an' that. Must mean they're both gonna be out chasing this one down for a while."  
  
"It's just... I've never seen anything like that body. Not this side of a war or a pretty major famine, at any rate. I mean, what could starve a girl to death without leaving any sign of restraint or imprisonment?"  
  
"I don't like it. Somethin's not right, when you get kids starvin' to death inna city like dat. I mean, dem gettin' thumped or pushed outta window, that you can unnerstand. We all know what kids dat age is like. But not dis."  
  
"Damn right, it ain't. Right, I mean. That sorta thing didn't go on even back when I was a kid. No matter if times were hard, there was always the cockroach farms down by Phedre Road, an' the Omnians were good for a free feed if you didn't mind listening to a lecture or fifteen. Huh, never thought I'd live to see it, girls starvin' to death in Ankh-Morpork. Particularly not when they look like that one prob'ly did afore whatever it was that got her got her..." Nobby smiled in a fond and faintly disturbing manner.  
  
"You'd better keep an eye on" Cheri nodded towards the apparently-oblivious Del in as subtle manner as a dwarf was able to muster (which was not, it must be said, particularly subtle) "tonight, Nobby. As long as we don't know what's going on around here she's as much in danger as the next girl, maybe more because of who her parents are."  
  
"She still don' show any sign of takin' after her Mum, den?"  
  
Cheri reached out and snapped her fingers in front of Del's face. Del who had been pretending to laugh uproariously as Buggy attempted to dislodge his sabre from the centre of the dartboard, where it'd been driven a few inches into the wall, now pretended to start and blink down at her aunt.  
  
"Del! You haven't noticed any - um, changes, recently? Anything you'd like to tell us about?"  
  
Del blushed furiously and buried her face in her lemonade. "No, actually. Not that it's ANY OF your business."  
  
Nobby looked affronted. "What? It IS our business, miss. We could always use another - ouch!" Cheri slid under the table, grasping its edge in her hands and stretched her body the length of the table in order to kick him in the ankles. Mentioning the W-word, even in the relative privacy of the Bucket, was not generally a wise idea. "I mean, another Captain. Yeah. We could always use another good female Captain."  
  
* * *  
  
Coralie Nailsande pulled the bolts shut in the glass-fronted shop door and leaned against the doorframe with a sigh of relief. "Well, lads, that's the last of them." She crossed the shop floor to the workshop area, where three figures were slumped around the workbench in various stages of exhaustion.  
  
Old Tom stood up and hobbled towards the door, wincing and stretching as he straightened his back. "Gods bless us, lass, I've never made so many boots in one day in all me life. Any news? Is there a shortage on or what's goin' on? We're not under siege, are we? I remember in the Century of the Fruitbat, when we ended up havin' to eat all the boots in the city and - "  
  
Coralie cut in quickly, having learnt by experience that cutting off Old Tom's stories as soon as possible was the only way to stem the flow. "No sieges, no major riots, nothing particular out of the ordinary. I got one of the customers to swap me an evening edition of the Times for a paper bag, and it didn't - "  
  
"A PAPER BAG, lass? They traded a whole news paper for one of our paper bags? What, with the crossword and everything?"  
  
"Yes! A paper bag! And we've even run out of those! It was insane! People just wanted anything, anything at all that said our name on it, it was as though they didn't really even want the boots themselves, just anything that said 'Blannick's' on it. Like it was the name they were buying..."  
  
Eleven-year-old Bobby Cattermole raised his head from a small puddle of drool on the bench, rubbing his eyes in exhaustion. "Can I go home now, Mr. Blannick? Only it's gone eleven, and our Mum says I've still got to get a good night's sleep or I shan't grow up and have my own shop and..."  
  
"Mr. Blannick?"  
  
"Mr. Blannick?"  
  
"Manny?"  
  
* * *  
  
Del strode home towards Shuttering Street, tailed by the dark figure of Uncle Nobby who seemed to believe that slinking from garbage bin to garbage bin and darting behind lantern poles at random moments constituted subtle shadowing. She didn't mind; in fact she found it rather sweet, really. Nice to know that someone was looking out for her, even if Del could probably have picked him up and, if she'd felt the remotest desire, swung him round and round her head. Overhead, the moon had dipped below the horizon but the stars were out, a swirl of silver specks on the warm black velvet of the night sky. Even the smell of bleach had finally dispersed from her hair and clothes, and she whistled softly as she removed the spare key from its hiding place (on her keyring; the last place any intruder would look*) and turned it in the front door.  
  
From his secret vantage point (under the window of Mrs. Morrock's cookshop on the other side of the road), Nobby Nobbs watched as his niece bent and retrieved a piece of parchment from the doormat. She stood silhouetted in the doorway, studying the document for a few minutes, then shut the door, turned and vanished.  
  
* Del's keyring was the indeed last place that any potential intruder would look for a key. Not because it was a particularly subtle or ingenious hiding place, but because her mother was a werewolf and her father was technically-a-dwarf, and both of them were officers of the City Watch. They had taught their daughter an *awful* lot about ways to make people's lives very unpleasant when strictly necessary.  
  
* * *  
  
And still the mirror waited. It hung there on the wall, outwardly so still and placid. But go near it and the sparks would crackle and sing, always daring you nearer, wanting better, wanting more.  
  
Hungry.  
  
* * *  
  
"Dear" (printed in fancy gold embossed engraving) "Del Ironfoundersdaughter" (scribbled in black ink)  
  
"You are invited to a Show of Fashion commencing at Eleven P.M tonight at the home of Lady Charnel, 24 Bournemouth St Ankh-Morkpork, celebrating Glamourouse Rayment and All That Is Latest in Forward Fashion including that which is Ready to Ware. Light refreshements will not be served. Dress: To Impresse."  
  
* * *  
  
Sergeant Colon was behind the front desk when the doors burst open again, revealing the red-faced, puffing and frantic figure of Corporal Nobbs.  
  
"Sarge! You'd better come quick! It's Carrot's lass, I followed her home, an' something weird's going on!"  
  
"Steady on, Nobby. You followed Miss Del - I mean, Lance-Constable Ironfoundersdaughter - home?"  
  
"Carrot's orders, sarge! He told me to see she got home safe, an' just as well too!"  
  
"Why, what'd you see?"  
  
Still gasping breathlessly, Nobby reached out both hands to steady himself against the old butcher's table which did duty as a reception desk at Psuedopolis Yard.  
  
"Well, she got home to Angua's house, right, and found this letter on the doormat. Dunno what was in it, but she read it through and was off like a shot, Sarge. Had a job tailing her, but she made it to Bournemouth St, and disappeared into this dead posh house."  
  
Colon raised an eyebrow. "Oho! Visiting a young man, was she? Well, old Carrot won't be too pleased about that, but it happens to us all sooner or later, I'm sure he'll - "  
  
"No, sarge! I got up to the house, right, an' climbed up -"  
  
"The drainpipe?"  
  
"You know that never works, sarge. I climbed up the house next door on account of someone was doing the guttering and left up a ladder. Got onna roof and jumped across and looked through the skylight, right. An' there was this big room inside, and all these nobs standin' around drinkin' champagne. And there was this, like, stage, see, only all long an' thin instead of square. And then this girl comes out with no clothes on!"  
  
"Go on, Nobby."  
  
"Only, it ain't just any girl, it's that Gerhardtina Sock that our miss went to school with! An' she's not quite in the, in the altogether, altogether, if you gets my meaning, sarge, she's wearing these bits of cloth tied around, likes, and it looks like someone's smacked her about an' given her two black eyes. And the lass walks up and down the long skinny stage and they all clap and drink their champagne. And then she goes out again... and comes back, wearin' different bits of cloth an' they all clap again! Ain't right in my book, sarge. Someone musta punched that poor girl out and made her parade around with no clothes on... and our Del's in there!".  
  
Colon stood, his face settling grimly. "Right. Get Anthracite and Detritus -"  
  
"They're off duty, sarge"  
  
"I don't care. Grab something from the weapons room for everybody, and let's move!"  
  
* * *  
  
Del was standing by the stage door when Gerhardtina emerged. She'd changed into a more normal dress, but her face was still flushed and smeared with the strange cosmetics that left black circles around the hollows of her eyes. "Del! You made it! Aren't Em's dresses just amazing?"  
  
Del frowned. "That's one word to describe - "  
  
"I'm so glad you liked them! Come on now, darling, there's someone here you just have to meet!" Gerhardtina grabbed Del by the hand and towed her in the direction of the bar.  
  
Darling? In the eleven years they'd known one another, Gerhardtina had addressed her by such affectionate epiphets as 'Wonko', 'Clumsy Slag', 'Ironfistedslaughter' and even (when she was feeling particularly vindictive) 'Delphine', but 'darling' was a hitherto unknown form of address. However, Del didn't have long to worry about it; through the blasts of excitingly coloured smoke and ranks of chattering people she could just glimpse the quarry Gerhardtina was steering them towards. Broad shoulders, a tumbling fringe of inky black hair; lazy, heavy-lidded indigo eyes, oh no oh no oh no...  
  
"Little Delphine Ironfoundersdaughter! My gods, it's been forever, how ARE you?"  
  
Bloody hell. Sammy Vimes.  
  
* * *  
  
"Manny? What's wrong?"  
  
"Mr. Blannick?"  
  
"Wake up, Manny lad, it's knocking-off time".  
  
The figure of Manny Blannick sat upright and oblivious, staring into space as his assistants shook him, poked his shoulders and waved their hands in front of his face in an effort to draw a response. His eyes were locked on a point somewhere towards the back of the room, his face frozen in a vague half-smile as he dreamed of footwear...  
  
* * *  
  
The charm, manners and personal appearance of young Lord Samuel Havelock Ramkin Vimes remained more or less a mystery to those who followed the lineage of Ankh-Morpork's noble families*. How the boy had managed to combine the Ramkin family DNA (which ran to height and bulk, brisk efficiency and good strong shouting voices) with the Vimes genetic legacy (scruffiness, dark hair, chronically snaky tempers) and come out with something resembling a Holy Wood matinee idol remained a generally well- concealed secret. Yet somehow, combine them he had; the offspring of a former street-pounding policeman and the city's premier lady breeder of fancy swamp dragons had turned out to be one of Ankh-Morpork's most eligible young noblemen. From his elegant fall of pitch-black hair to the tips of his feet (shod in a pair of rather fetching boots a young admirer picked up for him at Blannick's that morning), Samuel exuded the kind of aura that causes young girls to blush and dream of they-know-not-what, and middle-aged women to keep perfectly straight faces while they contemplate they-know-exactly-what. With his father's approval (and his mother's secret relief) the young Lord Vimes had politely declined the opportunity to join the Watch on his eighteenth birthday, and instead was rumoured to spend his days fulfilling the duties formerly carried out by the late Rufus Drumknott as Undersecretary to Lord Vetinari. His nights, as chronicled by the A- M.W.M.F.W-W-E-P-A-S-M-G-A-P-W-A-L-M-M-T-T**, were generally spent at glamourous parties, accompanied by a string of beauties from the city's most gracious and noble families.  
  
Del hadn't spent much time with Samuel since they were small. They had solemnly traded unwanted Hogswatchnight presents (her ebony comb-and-brush set for his new lacrosse stick) the day before Samuel had left for Hugglestones, a particularly unpleasant boarding school that his maternal great-aunt had insisted he attend.  
  
* The ranks of those pursuing this particular interest had increased significantly following William de Worde's (reluctant) publication of the 'ANKH-MORPORK WEEKLY MAGAZINE FOR WOMEN-WHO-ENJOY-POINTLESS-AND-SLIGHTLY- MALICIOUS-GOSSIP-ABOUT-PEOPLE-WITH-A-LOT-MORE-MONEY-THAN-THEM'.  
  
** Which Del certainly never read. Never, ever, ever, EVER. Under any circumstances. Not even if someone had happened to leave a copy in the Watch House tea room with the crossword only half done...  
  
* * *  
  
From "Misftrefs Apollonia's Guide To Moddern Ettiquete and Hostessery", p.75  
  
"On being introduced to a Young Gentilmanne of Equal or Greater Ranke, a Young Ladie should make a Courtesey, and express pleasure at the meetinge; honoure &tc. Under no circumstaunces shoulde she Babble, make unnecessary speech or otherwise appear Ill-Bredd or Rude. She shoulde of course also endeavoure to appear Well Groomed and most Pleasinge to the Eye while this introduction takes playse."  
  
* * *  
  
"Sammy. Er, um, I mean, Lord Samuel, I should say. Your grace. Er. Nice to see you again."  
  
"Likewise, I'm sure, my dear cousin Delphine."  
  
There was an awkward pause. Del could feel the heat rising from under her breastplate and suffusing her face in a horrible shade of ruptured-blood- vessel fuschia that clashed violently with her carrotty hair. Gods, she couldn't even blush attractively. At moments like this, she was always self- conscious of the size of her shoulders, hip-bones, hands and feet, felt herself filling the room like some sort of outsized giantess. At this particular moment, she was also painfully aware that she was dressed in rough brown breeches, a copper breastplate and sweaty helmet hair in a roomful of exquisitely coiffed nobles. Gerhardtina broke the silence as diplomatically as possible  
  
"Lord Samuel, you will have heard that Del is a Watchwoman?"  
  
Del's face having turned as hectically pink as physically possible, her ears began to get in on the act. "I've only just joined two days ago."  
  
"Splendid, splendid. That explains the costume, of course. Very suitable. And - how charming! - do I detect a a hint of lemon scent?"  
  
Del squinted determinedly down at the bleach-charred toecaps of her boots. "Lemon scent. Yes. That's right, your Lordship." It was going to be a long evening...  
  
to be continued... 


	5. Chapter Five

Chapter Five  
  
Dearest Grandemother, and Grand Father,  
  
I write to tell you that I have returned from a Fashion Parayde at, the house of Ladie Selachiiii. I sawe many of the New Seeson Fashions but, I did not like themme very much. Afterwards there was a Parte, It was moste, Horrible, for I did not knowe any Body there excepte Sammy Vimes, who has become a most dredful Fopp, and even my own Gerhardtina was behaving, moste Strangely. I was well gladde to leave Early and stay there no more. Mother and Father are, well and send their beste wishes as does  
  
your granddaughter  
  
Del  
  
* * *  
  
An angry mob, distinct only from the general standard run of Ankh- Morporkian angry mobs by the fact that this one happened to be dressed in the uniform of the City Watch, swarmed up Bournemouth St towards the Selachii mansion. The mob's leader pounded with his truncheon on the elegant wrought-iron gates.  
  
"Oy! Open up! Watch business!".  
  
Jaimes the butler glided through the front door and pulled open the gates with an elegant flourish. What greeted him in the forecourt was not a comforting sight. Cold moonlight gleamed off scratched and dented armour. Swords and daggers were mismatched, but wickedly sharp, and pointed in a no- nonsense fashion at the general vicinity of Jaimes's neck. Bootlaces trailed, and the large angry-looking gentleman towards the front of the pack appeared to be wearing a pair of GREY WOOLLEN SOCKS with his OPEN TOED SANDALS. Jaimes winced and pressed a hand to his temple in abject horror. He turned and shouted back into the hall of the building.  
  
"Emergency! Cartson! Kyaine! Tohm! Tehd! Come quickly, you're needed!".  
  
The Watch stared as a number of men dressed in very expensive clothes slithered down a pole at the far end of the hall. Jaimes turned to the wearer of the offending socks. "You first, sir. Come this way as quickly as you can, please, and for Prada's sake don't *touch* anything."  
  
* * *  
  
"Well, thank-you very much for letting us look around anyway, Mrs. Rackthorne. And do tell Mr. Rackthorne I hope old Maisy gets over that nasty case of the scroggs before too long."  
  
Carrot tramped down the steps; his expression unreadable.  
  
A plain, whitewashed room, neatly mended clothes folded away in the dresser. A few thin, cheaply-printed books and magazines strewn over the bedside table. Elaine Clutterbuck had been a quiet girl who stayed in her room for most of the day. She'd earned a living sewing piecework for one of the dressmaking houses in Cunning Artificers, until she'd stopped bringing in baskets of work a few weeks ago. She'd gradually stopped leaving her room, her landlords assuming that she'd simply started keeping night hours like so many seamstresses had before her. And she'd died there, in that bright, empty little room. "Never given me any trouble, poor soul" Mrs Rackthorne had told him, "and always on time with the rent. Such a pretty girl, too, and so sweet. It's a crying shame.".  
  
Angua stepped out of the shadows to join him, glancing at his face and refraining from asking how the enquiry had gone.  
  
"I found this". He held it out. "On her bedside table".  
  
Angua sniffed at the bundle of papers. It smelled like nothing else in the city, like something she hadn't come across since Uberwald. It smelled like home. There was anxiety there, overlaid with self-doubt and self-loathing exorcised through pain. Fear. Love and hate and strange chemicals mingled in the well-thumbed pages, and her eyes flickered over the headlines on the foremost page. "Lose Fifteen Pounds in Two Weeks". "New Spring Looks for Every Species". A smile pulled up the corners of her savage mouth. Well, *almost* every species.  
  
High above them, the gargoyle perched on the guttering of the Landresses' Guild raised one heavy forelimb, then the other, in an unmistakable clacks signal. Carrot and Angua froze, then looked at one another. He spoke first, in a comforting cliche. "Trouble at Mr. Blannick's leather workshop?".  
  
And through the dark streets wolf and man ran headlong side by side.  
  
* * *  
  
Sammy and Gerhardtina watched as their erstwhile cousin and friend bumbled her way towards the door, tripping over a diminutive old lady in a tiara and almost snapping in half a spectrally thin woman in pink chiffon.  
  
"Strange girl" he remarked, flipping back a lock of midnight hair that had never really been out of place.  
  
Gerhardtina smiled and extended her long neck, making the tiniest purring sound. "Well, she was a dear to come, in any case. I didn't really think this would be Del's sort of scene."  
  
"What would be? Digging in the mud for miscreants, I suppose."  
  
Both Gerhardtina and Samuel swung around to observe the braying source of this new conversation.  
  
"I loved your work tonight, 'Tina. Beautiful, beautiful stuff, you just bring the collection alive, darling. And Lord Samuel, so nice to see you looking... well. And do my eyes deceive me, or are those Manny Blannicks?".  
  
The thing that used to be Emmelina Cosmopilite was cruising towards them, smiling like a shark*.  
  
* The shark in question would most probably be the Rimwards Ocean Lipstick Shark, a rare and truly disturbing creature that lives in the fast-moving currents of the outer Rim, preying on smaller, less fashionable fish which it usually frightens to death by spreading rumours behind their backs.  
  
* * *  
  
"Oh, but Kyaine, you have to leave him the moustache! It's so cute! Very Village People."  
  
"Which village?"  
  
"Sto Plains, I expect. Or one of those weird little ones in Lancre, you know, where the straight people all marry their cousins and spend too much time with their sheep. Anyway, the moustache stays."  
  
"OK, but I'm gonna make him zhjuje it with some product."  
  
"Mousse?"  
  
"Oh yeah!"  
  
Fred Colon shifted uneasily. In the fifteen minutes or so he'd been separated from his fellow watchmen, he'd been surrounded and whisked upstairs by this crowd of swiftly-chattering men dressed in very expensive clothes. He now appeared to be in one of the guest bedrooms of Lady Selachii's house, where two strangely-named men were arguing over his facial hair while a small blond person named Cartson produced endless garments from a large purple closet and entreated him to try them on.  
  
"Come on, just put it on for a little bit, OK?" Cartson shook a royal blue velvet smoking jacket in a gesture that was presumably meant to be inviting. "It's going to bring out your eyes fabulously, and then we'll just have to fix up that footwear issue before you go see Jaimes to get your hair scenario re-structured!"  
  
"Now just wait a minute, mate. As an officer of the City Watch, I don't think that you've any call to be -".  
  
Cartson stamped his foot. "Well, if you're going to be like that, I don't think I'll bother doing the rest of your colours!". He gazed at Colon, then softened. "No, that's cruel. Look, I know these are really big changes to your fashion story, Fred, but the end result is going to be really amazing. Fred, don't do this for me, do it for yourself! And do it for the sake of 'Slightly Odd Eye for the Perpendicular Person', OK honey?".  
  
As he shrugged his way into the smoking jacket and sat passively while another small chattery man named something unpronounceable splattered something thick, cold and improbably chocolatey-smelling across his face, Colon couldn't help but feel that something had gone horribly awry somewhere along the line...  
  
* * *  
  
And now, a variation of the scene that was going on all around the city...  
  
Mica the young troll slumped on her bed, sadly turning the pages of a magazine. If troll mattresses weren't made mostly of granite, with a basalt under layer for comfort and support, she might had buried her face in the bed and burst into tears. Her younger sister Zirconia walked into the room, took one look at Mica's face and sat down on the edge of the bed.  
  
"Mica. You look like troll lose piece of argon, find piece of calcium precipitate. What wrong?"  
  
Mica sniffled, a truly disturbing sound when emanating from a nose roughly the size of a loaf of bread. She held up the centrefold picture of 'Ankh- Morpork Vague', the magazine dwarfed, perhaps even gnomed, by the size of her massive, broad-knuckled troll hand.  
  
"Look at dat, Zirc. What dat look like to you?"  
  
Zirconia picked up the magazine and studied it. "Look like skinny human female what not got enough food or clothes."  
  
"Exactly!"  
  
Zirconia frowned. "You cryin' because humans not got enough food to eat?". Her sister Mica had never been known for her charitable impulses at home on Copperhead, although her personality had branched out somewhat on the family's recent trip to Ankh-Morpork. Since the character traits for which Mica had been known *did* include violent outbursts and the clobbering of siblings with random pieces of the landscape, Zirconia decided to play it low-key. "Cause dat's OK if you is, I'm sure we can find some way to make sure der poor humans gets - "  
  
"NO! You ain't looking prop'ly! Dat lady in der picture, she ain't unhappy! Dat beauty, fashion, *glamour*. Dat how you supposed to look. You dat size, you can wear pretty clothes, top fashion designs what only come in small sizes! Not like" Mica gestured towards her own powerfully muscled form stretched out on the bed "dis! You think they ever put troll girl in magazine? No! Because troll girl ugly, lumpy, disgustin' ...".  
  
Zirconia reached out and gently took the magazine from her sister's hands. She flicked through the pages, searching. "Don't be silly, Mica. Look. Here's a picture. They do put troll in magazine, see?" Mica started up eagerly, then slumped back. "Yeah. Next to heading dat say 'Don't Worry About Being Beautiful, Just Be Happy With Yourself The Way You Are'."  
  
Zirconia, a somewhat slower reader, squinted at the lines of text next to the picture of a smiling female troll, her frown deepening from puzzlement to hostility. "'Even der ugliest and stupiddest troll can achieve a fac-sim- il-e of happiness if she t'inks positive an' maintains a happy per-son-al- it-y'? Mica, what is dis coprolite you readin'?"  
  
Beside her, regardless of the hardness of the bed, Mica buried her face in the mattress and began to wail.  
  
* * *  
  
"He's been like this for a couple of hours, now."  
  
The inner door to the workshop opened and Angua stepped in, human-formed and hurriedly re-adjusting the neckline of her shirt. Carrot turned towards her from the workbench, where he and Coralie Nailsande were bent over the frozen body of Immanuel Blannick.  
  
"He'd been working all day. The shop just went crazy, I've never seen anything like it. I had to send Tommy and Ben home, they were exhausted."  
  
"And was Mr. Blannick sick, or behaving oddly, anything like that?"  
  
"Well, he was acting strange this morning before we opened. Kept going on about finding the perfect sole, and shoe-making being his Art Form. Not like Manny at all, he used to say "just bang in the nails and it'll be right, it's all just clodhoppers for a bunch of stupid cop... erm, sorry, no offence meant."  
  
Carrot smiled tiredly. "None taken. I'm afraid we've got no leads to go on for the moment, Mistress Nailsande. There are a lot of unusual things going on around the city at the moment, as I'm sure you don't need to be told."  
  
Angua patted the exhausted woman on the shoulder. "We can arrange for him to be taken down to the Yard if you like. Someone can at least keep an eye on him and make sure he's warm, and we'll knock up a doctor to take a look at him in the morning."  
  
"Thank-you, Captain. I'd appreciate that."  
  
They looked at one another, three confused, worried faces in the candle- light.  
  
* * *  
  
Champagne corks popped. Laughter, shrill and husky, ran and poured and trickled through the room. She took them by the arms and moved them through the crowd, her beautiful creatures, her own, making for the stage door, a strange triumvirate of shetland pony, tiger and gazelle... ... and blue sparks flashed and flickered between them.  
  
* * *  
  
It was half past two, and C.M.O.T. Dibbler was starting to get worried. His usually brisk trade in dodgy snack food had suddenly fallen right off, for no discernable reason. It was a beautiful spring night, and in accordance with the best traditions of Ankh-Morporkian nightlife the streets should have been awash with young lovers needing to be sold wilted cellophane- wrapped roses, children requiring brightly-coloured and dubiously-flavoured ice-lollies and drunks seeking midnight sausages in buns. His best customers were suddenly nowhere to be found, and his cries advertising his wares had gone unheeded all night long.  
  
He tried again. "RAT ONNA STI-ICK! SAUSAGE INNA BUN!!"  
  
He picked out two figures advancing down the street, and identified them as Sargent Anthracite and Corporal Dwarrows of the City Watch. "Evening officers! Fancy a nice hot snack on this chilly night? Got some lovely rat juice and hot shale on the boil, twopence a cup and that's cutting-"  
  
"- your own throat" chorussed Anthra and Dwarrows wearily. The shorter Watchwoman eyed Dibbler suspiciously. He was well used to this; in fact he tended to worry about customers who *didn't* eye him suspiciously; all too often nowadays they turned out to be Undercover Food Inspectors sent out by Commander Vimes. But Dibbler had become, over the years, a connoisseur of different kinds of suspicious gaze, ranging from the basic "Are-you-really- sure-this-pie-is-chicken?" to the more complex "What's-this-wobbly-green- bit-over-here-and-I-don't-remember-asking-for...well,-bloody-hell-that-had- better-be-gravy!". The particular combination of squinty, piercing eyes and pursed mouth currently before him was one he had never seen before. It was as though the dwarf was concerned, not about the (traditionally non- existent) quality of the food, but as though she somehow distrusted the presence of food itself. In a city were comestibles were usually prized for cheapness, availability and largeness of portions, it was unheard-of for anyone, particularly a dwarf, to reject or refuse any food that didn't actually attempt to slither off the plate.  
  
"Excuse me? Mr. Dibbler? How many grams of fat are there in one of your rats on a stick?"  
  
* * *  
  
"All things just keep getting better - " Cartson and Kyaine were humming cheerfully as they led the way down a long corridor. In the distance, Colon could make out the sounds of music, voices and shuffling feet as he was led into a small ante-chamber, where a truly disturbing sight met his eyes.  
  
"Nobby?"  
  
"I've had my colours done, sarge!" Nobby beamed proudly.  
  
* * *  
  
"OK, so that's one skinny rat with low-killer-jewel-ketchup, a jumbo-sized mug of weak fat-free-soy half-decaf-rat-juice extra-hot with less whisker, and a half-serving of ninety-nine-point-nine-percent sediment-free shale."  
  
"Hold on! I don't want powdered granite onna shale!"  
  
"And I ORDERED a mug-a-weak fat-free-soy-half-decaf-rat-juice extra-hot with MORE whisker! You stupid or something?"  
  
"An' no powdered granite onna shale!"  
  
* * *  
  
The girl in the mirror looked back at her, face collapsed into an expression of lumpen, square-jawed misery. Blood swept across her features as she recalled her stumbling, stuttering performance at the party, making a fool of herself.  
  
"What am I good for?" the girl silently asked her reflection. She answered her own question, "Scrubbing stone with bleach, and getting shouted at by everyone who comes along." She had always been dimly aware that everyone who'd known her parents had wondered; what the child of a werewolf and the lost heir to the throne would be like, who she would grow up to be. A perfect princess, with her father's easy grace and kingliness shining out of her mother's beautiful face? A powerful bimorph stalking the city in wolf form, armed with knowledge, ferocity and strength? In either case, they'd undoubtedly expected the greatest Watchwoman the city had ever seen. And instead they'd gotten *her*. Couldn't even make a decent copper, not with every single advantage she had going for her. Big stupid lump, ugly, clumsy, no good for anything except screwing up and getting into trouble, disappointing her parents (assuming they were even around to be disappointed) and embarrassing her friends and relatives so badly they didn't even want to be seen in public with her any more.  
  
Del gazed into the flat, unfriendly glass surface, hating it, that heavy, sorry face. Big bony shoulders, scrappy, sweaty hair, drooping mouth and sad blue eyes.  
  
And dancing in the ocean depths were tiny electric-blue sparks... 


	6. Chapter Six

Chapter Six  
  
It was old Willikins' day off, and so Sammy Vimes shuffled towards the madly-clanging front door of the Ramkin-Vimes mansion. His feet were clad in a pair of Blannick's butter-soft calf-leather house slippers, his pyjamas were Emmelina Cosmopilite couture, and he sported an apricot facial masque and a Sto Plains cucumber slice over each eye. It had been a heavy night; after his brief stroll on the catwalk, each and every one of Lady Selachii's well-heeled guests had wanted to meet the handsome male fashion model. Quite a lot of them had offered him quite large glasses of quite expensive champagne. As a result, Sammy had woken up to find a rather wan and bilious-looking figure, who had introduced himself as the Oh God of hangovers, sitting on the end of his bed sipping mineral water and leafing through Sammy's imported coach-freighted copy of 'Klatchian Vague'.  
  
Removing the left-hand cucumber, Sammy opened the corresponding eye and pulled the door aside. Five men in rather attractive off-the-peg suits and excellent hair-dos were posing on the front doorstep. One was holding a large, cumbersome hair-styling device.  
  
"Surprise!  
  
"Surprise what? And this had better be good, 'cause I don't get out of bed for less than ten thousand dollars a day."  
  
"Surprise makeover! Not that you look like you need it. We're here for Commander Vimes."  
  
Sammy frowned, then quickly reset his face before the apricot masque had time to crack. "I'm his - er - son. What d'you want with him?"  
  
"We're on a mission to make him FAB! We're making over the City Watch, one tarnished copper breastplate at a time!"  
  
Sammy shrugged inexpressively, and shuffled back up the stairs to resume communion with the Oh God. Tohm, Tehd, Jaimes, Cartson and Kyaine bounded past him down the long, expensively-carpeted hall, occasionally shuddering at the odd over-coloured tapestry and wincing over Lady Sybil's collection of glass and china dragon ornaments.  
  
"Ten thousand dollars a day? But... what if he has to go to the privy and he doesn't have enough change?"  
  
"Shut up, Cartson."  
  
* * *  
  
"HEY, TROLLS! F*** S*** UP! REVOLUTION AN' NOTHING BUT! RIOT! DON'T DIET! GET UP, GET OUT AND TRY IT!" Sacharissa Cripslock twitched the curtain aside, glancing at the scene in the laneway outside. A small group of mixed species was gathered outside the delivery door of the Bucket, waving placards and chanting. A zombie was wearing a t-shirt that said "Love Your Body The Way It Is - Dead or Alive", and three female trolls held aloft a painted banner reading "BIG IS BEAUTIFUL". She pulled the curtain closed again, looking worried.  
  
"Mr. Goodmountain? Why are there a number of large angry people outside the door shouting impolite slogans?"  
  
Gunilla Goodmountain, printer, stuck his head around the door of the printshop. "Um. Um, I think it's probably something to do with this." He held up a familiar bundle of papers, printed in bright colours.  
  
"Better wossnames now?" Sacharissa frowned. "That's hardly in the best of taste. I can quite see why people are getting upset about it. Mr. Goodmountain, who sent us this to have printed in the first place?".  
  
"I don't KNOW" said Gunilla wretchedly. "It just turned up on the doorstep a few days ago, all tied up with silver ribbon and I thought, well, the press is free for an hour or so, let's chuck it through and see if it sells any copies."  
  
"And?" she regarded him, one eyebrow a marked half-inch higher than the other.  
  
"Seventh impression. In five days."  
  
Sacharissa whistled in a most unlady-like fashion. "That's a lot of copies walking out of here."  
  
"We're making a disturbing amount of money, even with the colour printing and iconographs. And I don't know what's upsetting the crowd out there so much, it's not as though we've never printed gossip magazines before."  
  
"Hmm." Sacharissa was leafing through the pages, her face suddenly absent.  
  
"Gunilla?"  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"Do you know if we have any celery sticks?"  
  
* * *  
  
"AND STAY OUT!"  
  
A tall, thin, dark-haired man in an immaculate suit went flying over the veranda roof of the Ramkin-Vimes mansion, landing with an ignominous thump in the manure pile. Two more thumps and two splashes followed in swift succession as his companions landed in the water-butt, the haystack, the cess-pool and the compost heap respectively. Jaimes clambered to his feet, struggling to brush the worst of the disgusting mess off his Manny Blannicks.  
  
"Well, that's the last time I try to help trim *his* nostril hair."  
  
* * *  
  
Del woke up to an empty house. Her mother's bed was unslept-in, and the unlatched window had not been opened. Tonight was the third night of the full moon; after this things would return to normal*. She moved towards the kitchen cabinet to pull out some breakfast; if she didn't eat before going to the Watch House Uncle Nobby would nag her about vitamins, and she'd never have the strength to stand up to that Sergeant Anthracite. But as she reached for the basket of eggs, a pale blue thought popped into her head, unbidden, like her own voice speaking coldly inside her skull.  
  
"You don't have to eat that, you know. In fact, you probably shouldn't."  
  
That's funny, she thought. Of course I should have breakfast, if I don't then I'll...  
  
"Lose weight. Look better. People might not hate you so much, then. It's not like you deserve anything to eat anyway, you stupid fat lump."  
  
Feeling slightly odd, Del poured herself a glass of water instead. She sat down at the kitchen table, picked up a pen and a sheet of paper. Without ever knowing really why she was doing it, feeling almost as though something else was writing through her, she began to make a list.  
  
Shoppinge, Lyst  
  
Cigarets Produckt for Hair Kola (?) that is Free of Sugare Diett Pilles, available from, Cm.OT Dibbler 1 lb. Blacke Coffe Ankh-Morpork Vague, Magge Zine  
  
* Well, as close to normal as things tended to get in a house occupied by a werewolf and a teenage half-werewolf-half-human-half-technically-dwarf-heir- to-the-city who didn't get out much.  
  
* * *  
  
Vimes stalked down Nonesuch Street, glowering at the new and florid evidences of stupidity popping out of the streetscape around him. From lamp- post to lamp-post above his head, two men in overalls were hanging a white- and-gold banner reading "ANKH-MORPORK FASHIONE WEEKE". Half of the shop windows were suddenly sporting emaciated-looking dressmaker's dummies set to the smallest possible measurements, draped in unusual combinations of rags, satin, velvet and lace. And a familiar-looking cart parked on the street corner had been painted overnight in strange new colours, and was incongruously decked with a massive quantity of fruit.  
  
"JUICY BITS" ran the sign. "LOW-KILLLER-JEWEL JUICES, SMOOTHIES AND UNIDENTIFIABLE MUSH! Guaranteed 100% FATTE FREE! C.M.O.T Dibbler, Prop."  
  
"Meal inna cu-up! Low killer jewel tasty treats!""  
  
Vimes stopped, and regarded the proprietor of this new food-service enterprise. Dibbler stood behind a row of large food blenders powered by pedals sticking out of the bottom of the cart. Behind him, a short girl was peeling a massive tub of oranges, her black hair scraped back into a stupid- looking baseball cap. The acid in the fruit juice had given her a nasty rash that covered both hands and was happily eating its way up her right arm; this didn't stop her from handling the raw fruit in true C.M.O.T Dibber food hygiene style. A name tag emblazoned on her luridly-coloured 'JUICY BITS' polo shirt read "HI, MY NAME IS MARY SUE... ASK ME ABOUT OUR SUPER STRAWBERRY DELIGHT SPECIAL". She glared at Vimes with the expression of a customer-serviceperson who really wishes that the customer would bugger off.  
  
Dibbler smiled broadly. "Good morning, Commander Vimes! For only fifty-nine pence, you too can get the convenience of a whole day's fruit in one cup! And for only a dollar extra, you get to pedal the engine that runs the blender yourself! A smoothie AND a workout all for the one price, you can't beat that! And as it's your first visit, I'll give you two extra stamps on your Customer Loyalty Card!"  
  
"My what?"  
  
Dibbler held out a small square of cardboard. "Every time you buy a drink, see, you get a little stamp dependin' on what kinda drink it is. A kumquat for any juice or smoothie to the value of fifteen pence or less, a pineapple for any drink to the value of thirty-five pence or less, and a little sun-shaped stamp for any Super-Jumbo-Sized Mega Juice to the value of fifty-nine pence. Oh, and if you get a half-measure of juice you get half a stamp, and any extra protein power or special Dibbler supplements gets you an extra half stamp. An' when you've collected twenty-five and a half stamps, you get..." Dibbler screwed up his face.  
  
"I get...?" Vimes prompted helpfully.  
  
"A free trial-sized junior helping of mountain-fresh spring water! Guaranteed 100% Ankh-free!"  
  
Vimes shook his head and headed off down the street, his expression as sour as one of Dibbler's Super Slimming Citrus Shakes.  
  
"C'mon, Mr. Vimes!" Dibbler shook one of the large paper cups invitingly. "Finally, fast food you don't have to feel guilty about!"  
  
"Dibber, I'd settle for food *you* don't have to feel guilty about."  
  
* * *  
  
The riot outside the Bucket had grown in numbers. It was now more of a looming, muttering crowd that choked the entire delivery lane and spilled out onto Gleam Street, blocking the pub's front entrance. On a soap-box* outside the printshop's door, a young female troll had set up a loudspeaker and was ferociously addressing the crowd.  
  
"Trolls! Humans, dwarfs, zombies, gnomes, vampires an' other friends! T'anks for comin' out today. My name's Zirconia, an' you're prob'ly thinkin' I look too young to be knowin' what I'm talkin' about, makin' a big speech at dis rally here today. But I gotta sister at home, she's too depressed to leave the house. Sits onna bed an' cries all day, won't eat or drink. She's sick, real sick. You wanna know why?"  
  
"Yeah!"  
  
"'Cause of readin" Zircona jerked a large, square hand towards the printshop door "dat poison dey're printin' in dere! Dat magazine, and da whole fashion industry, per-pet-u-ates impossibly narrow stereotypes of what's beautiful. It's speciesist, sexist and it's hurtin' young females all over da city!"  
  
"Damn right!" "You said it!" Cheers and whistles erupted from the crowd.  
  
"We got females bein' told dat dey gotta look an' act in ways dat dey just physically can't. If you troll, can't be in fashion 'cause you too big. You dwarf, can't be model 'cause you too short, an' also beards not fashion- able, 'pparently. An' even human girls, what you'd t'ink don't need to worry, are starvin' themselves and havin' dis creepy t'ing call cos-met-ic surgery, where dey get parts of demselves cut off!  
  
Murmurs of shock and disgust ran through the crowd, even though they'd all heard the rumours about what had been going on in the backyard surgeries of the Shades.  
  
"Dey make us feel bad about ourselves 'cause when we do, dey're able to sell us more clothes, make us pay for surgery, cosmetics an' stupid diet food! We worryin' about how we look all da time, we ain't able to focus on da stuff dat really matters. Are we gonna stan' for bein' told what we should look like by some stupid magazine?"  
  
"HELLS NO!"  
  
"Dere ARE females what're willing to resist! Trolls an' dwarfs and females of all species gotta stand up! We ain't ashamed of who we are, no matter how much da fashion industry wants us to be! So I say we trash da place! Let's show 'em what healthy, strong bodies what ain't been starved or cut up in the name of some un-att-ain-able human-centric physical ideal can do!"  
  
The crowd moved in an ominous wave towards the printshop door.  
  
* The mysterious, and frequently inexplicable, appearance of a soap-box, fruit-crate or other wooden produce-receptacle at any occasion where impassioned speeches protesting the status quo are to be made is a universal convention across the Discworld, and in fact has its own governing mystical being, the Soap-Box Fairy.  
  
* * *  
  
The tea room in the Watch House was a scene of greater than usual chaos. Anthracite and Dwarrows were comparing their 'JUICY BITS' customer loyalty cards, and arguing over whether a pineapple with a missing corner was worth more free smoothie points than a slightly squashed looking kumquat. Sergeant Morraine and Corporal Littlebottom were both resolutely cheating on the 'IS YOUR SKIN BABY-SOFT?' quiz in the latest edition of 'Vague'. Young Ironfoundersdaughter was sitting in a corner, looking pale and peaky and clutching a steaming cup of Sham Harga's midnight coffee like a lifeline to a drowning woman. Detritus appeared to be painting his nails with a small container of bubbling liquid mercury. And Nobby Nobbs and Fred Colon, both out of uniform and dressed in unfamiliarly clean and well-co- ordinated outfits, were trying to admire their reflections in the mirror on the wall. Sadly, the mirror had been hung for the benefit of Angua in the early days of the modern Watch, and was a long, thin sheet of glass mounted at a tall female human's head height. As a result, Colon was jigging from side to side in an effort to get the mirror to encompass his entire physique, while Nobby was forced to jump up and down just to catch a glimpse of the top of his head. Both were also shoving one another and loudly ordering their counterpart to clear off and stop hogging the mirror.  
  
"ALL RIGHT! EVERYBODY SHUT UP RIGHT BLOODY NOW!"  
  
Vimes surveyed his command. He briefly wondered why Detritus was carrying a patent leather satchel, and why Colon's face appeared to be covered in more chocolate than was strictly usual, but decided not to pull at any loose threads lest the somewhat frayed and washed-out fabric that was the Watch at that particular moment completely unravel.  
  
"What do we know about this thing? That it seems to be focussing mainly on young people, especially girls. That it causes people to act like id - well, even more like idiots than they usually do. That there's a riot outside the Bucket, and that's just not on, that's our bloody pub they're ripping apart. And that Angua and Carrot are out there somewhere and haven't reported back here in over twenty-four hours."  
  
There was a worried silence, punctuated only by Nobby zhjujing an eyebrow hair that had been knocked out of place in the battle for the mirror.  
  
"Ironfoundersdaughter?"  
  
"Yes, Commander?"  
  
"In sight of these factors... as far as this goes against my better judgement... you're on the case." 


End file.
